LANDLORD TO THE BIRDS 3 



tor Forbush is too careful and conservative. The 

 toll of bird life due to farm cats alone in the single 

 state of Massachusetts is probably in excess of 

 1,000,000 a year. To this huge total we must 

 probably add another 1,000,000 for the toll taken 

 by the domestic pets and stray cats and their 

 descendants, now gone wild. Few people have any 

 conception of the number of cats gone wild there 

 are in our woods. 



Now, undoubtedly, if cats were licensed as dogs 

 are, and men appointed to dispose of the strays, 

 there would be a great and immediate diminution 

 of the feline population, still more noticeable in a 

 second generation, for the females would pay a 

 higher fee. The cats which remained would be 

 those valued and cared for as pets (and if a person 

 isn't willing to pay one or two dollars a year for 

 his or her pet, his attachment isn't very strong) 

 or else those cats valuable as destroyers of rodents. 

 The stray cat, that has to hunt for a living, would 

 be eliminated, as would the present excess of half- 

 stray house and barn cats. There would be little 

 hardship to the farmer, because a good barn cat 

 earns its license fee; and, besides, very few cats 

 are as effective as traps, anyhow, as careful experi- 

 ments have again and again proved. Finally, an 

 added revenue would accrue to the state. 



But why go to all this trouble merely to save 

 2,000,000 birds a year? asks the sentimental cat- 

 lover, who would rather have the cat than the blue- 

 birds and song-sparrows, because he (or she) cannot 

 pat a bluebird, nor dangle a string before its young. 



The answer is, because the birds help to maintain 



